Land use practices, growth and climate change have significant impact on watersheds and water flow. If not properly managed, this can lead to flooding, damage to infrastructure, loss of life and irreparable harm to natural ecosystems.
Greenland International Consulting Ltd. (Greenland®) is determined to make sure, through best available science and innovative technologies that these things don’t happen – but first, they have to figure out how to harness multi-format data scattered among government and non-government databases and turn it into value for their clients and customers. Big data can create big headaches.
Greenland® was incorporated as a professional engineering firm 20 years ago. From the beginning, R. Mark Palmer, P. Eng., the President and CEO, has been instrumental for the company’s success. In 2003, after seeing where he could lead Greenland® into another decade of growth, Palmer purchased all assets with his wife (and business partner), Jane. They have never looked back. They now work with a team of partners, associates and dedicated employees and expanded their vision for the development of open data decision support systems, new products, and commitment to corporate – social values, such as financially supporting public education and creating partnerships.
Since 2003, Greenland® has grown a profitable business model that creates value for its shareholders, clients and customers. As a visionary, Palmer has seen the value of private-public collaborations with research and his consulting engineers practice, and in sharing expertise that results in new tools, products and knowledge. “It is a business model that has worked very well for us and established our unique industry brand” he says “and one that we can say proudly that Greenland® is an award-winning Canadian enterprise with a global impact.”
It is no surprise that the start of the company’s third decade of operations has led to an exciting partnership with Communitech’s DATA.BASE program, University of Waterloo and the Centre for Community Mapping (COMAP). Greenland® and these partners are further developing the CANadian Watershed Evaluation Tool (CANWET™) and creating the first ever Canadian web-based watershed modeling platform (with climate change impact capabilities) that will include unlimited access to open databases for pollution control, source water protection, nutrient management and wastewater infrastructure planning and design projects.
Rewind to 2003, when the CANWET™ story began. Greenland® had just partnered with Dr. Barry Evans at Penn State University to explore over 50 watershed modelling tools for use in Ontario. By 2006, the Iraq and Afghanistan military interventions were in full swing and funding for the environmental sector by the United States government was being cut back and affecting research collaborations at Penn State. Recognizing the value in the original source code and positive impact development of the tool could have in Canada and worldwide, Greenland® purchased the source code. Over time with Dr. Evans, and when funding was available from Canada’s National Research Council, Greenland® converted the Penn State software version from an Environmental Sciences
Research Institute (ESRI)-based tool to a much lower cost, open source GIS system for use in Canada on river basin management, lake protection, municipal infrastructure, water use stress assessment, source water protection, food source protection, and climate change impact related projects.
Palmer first hired programmers to develop previous versions of CANWET™ but found that progress was not as efficient as he would like. “Basically, I realized there was a ‘smarter not harder’ way to develop our in-house suite of tools by leveraging other resources and partnering with a renowned/second-to-none group in computer science.”
Based on the company’s past success through partnerships, Greenland® began looking for a new partner to push development of CANWET™ and its other engineering models. Palmer was introduced to Dr. Donald Cowan at the University of Waterloo. They began a discussion about transforming CANWET™ into an open source and web-based platform that could then be used to not only expand business opportunities for Greenland® but also contribute to Canadian public and First Nations education programs.
Today, Greenland® provides environmental and infrastructure engineering services with proprietary software tools for economic growth and asset sustainability projects and now has many irons in the fire, including partnerships affecting the oil and gas industry and knowledge transfer - employment skills training collaborations with First Nations.
It was through its relationship with UW’s Dr. Cowan that Greenland® was introduced to Communitech. “We were blown away when we took the tour,” Palmer says. “When we saw the incubation model we knew that there was something that could be done through new partnerships that would advance our in-house technology, but also help us expand the goodwill of Greenland® into the North with First Nations communities and public education in general. This was exciting for us.”
The Greenland® big data project and vision was a perfect fit for Communitech’s DATA.BASE program. DATA.BASE is collaboration of government, business and post-secondary institutions that seek to tap into “big data” and harness both the value and the knowledge.
From a business standpoint, Palmer believes strongly that there are no economic or social advantages to just selling software licenses. “Providing niche tools with our core environmental services, and being hired by industry to maintain, run and train clients with our tools via an ecosystem support services approach, is how I see Greenland® will continue to grow and as it enters its third decade of profitability,” he contends.
Together with UW, COMAP and Communitech, Greenland® has now embarked on the “5th version” of CANWET™ and which will see the tool’s integration with various Ontario watershed databases and development of middleware to connect to various data sets. In addition, the new web-based interface and open source GIS platform will also provide predictive capabilities about how watersheds will respond in various scenarios, such as proposed land use changes with climate change factors, and provide users the ability to model remediation strategies from cost-benefit and management target perspectives.
It is the beginning of the vision; a much bigger open-source, web-based platform that will be open to everyone in the industry for planning, design, prevention and publication education. This new partnership is also important for Greenland® to develop further its other trademark software tools for stormwater management, Low Impact Development (LID), real-time flood forecasting and flood damage prevention.
“In addition to it being a powerful suite of tools for our core engineering business, it really opens the global village for people seeing the data, and understanding the science behind the development of these tools,” Palmer believes.
For him, private-public business partnerships have always been good business.
“This project with Communitech DATA.BASE will give us the building blocks for further funding with other partners, but also strengthens the industry presence for the other services we provide,” Palmer said. “For a small business that has limited resources, we wouldn’t be able to do this technology development without the Waterloo partnership.”
